1 Of 6 Prototypes Made: The Peugeot 505 Pick-Up Double Cabine Gruau

This is one of just six Peugeot 505 Pick-Up Double Cabine Gruau prototypes that were made, it was a vehicle designed to combine the best features of a passenger car with the utility of a pick-up truck.

In a way this car was the French answer to the Australian ute or the American pick-up truck, and it would have been ideal for tradespeople who needed a truck and a family sedan, but couldn’t afford both.

Fast Facts – The Peugeot 505 Pick-Up

• The Peugeot 505 Pick-Up Double Cabine Gruau was developed in the mid-1980s as a commercial vehicle with the benefits of a passenger car.
• The plan had been to get the vehicle commercial vehicle due to the advantageous tax status enjoyed by such vehicles in Europe. Sadly the commercial status of the vehicle was rejected and as a result the planned production run was cancelled.
• Power is provided by a 2.5 liter diesel engine, it has a manual transmission, and the rear load bay has a maximum weight allowance of 675 kilograms or 1,488 lbs.
• Just six prototypes were made, this is one of them and it recently underwent a refurbishment to give it the same appearance as the original show car, with the same blue and red side stripes.

The Peugeot 505 – Workhorse of Africa

The Peugeot 505 was introduced in 1979 as an evolution of the outgoing Peugeot 504, although no one knew it at the time the 505 would become known as the “Workhorse of Africa” and it would provide an invaluable locally-built transportation option in developing countries like China, Indonesia, Chile, Argentina, Thailand, Nigeria, Taiwan, Malaysia, and Egypt.

This unusual 505 offers four doors and seating for five, with the added benefit of a pick-up truck bed in the rear.

The simplicity of the Peugeot 505 worked in its favor and it proved to be a remarkably tough vehicle for a passenger car that was originally designed to be used in Europe. The car features a steel unibody design with a longitudinally-mounted engine sending power back through either a manual or automatic transmission to the rear wheels.

The styling of the 505 was a joint effort between Pininfarina and Peugeot, and the vehicle was offered as a variety of body styles including as a four-door sedan, a five-door station wagon (estate), and in prototype form as a coupe, a two-door convertible, and as a four-door pick-up truck.

Most examples of the Peugeot 505 had independent front and rear suspension however a live axle rear end was used on some models in some markets due to its additional strength and simplicity.

Braking was accomplished with discs up front and either discs or drums in the rear depending on the model, and engines varied widely with smaller 1.8 liter petrol engines offered right the way through to turbodiesels and the 2.8 liter PRV V6 – the same engine used in the DeLorean DMC-12.

The Peugeot 505 would remain in production from 1979 until 1997, with the final production cars rolling off the factory floor in Guangzhou, China.

The tailgate folds down to allow easy access to the cargo bay, and there are grab handles along the sides and rear.

In many developing countries the 505 is still a regular sight on the roads, with local mechanics doing a remarkable job at keeping them running even after decades of use on rough dirt tracks.

The Peugeot 505 Pick-Up Double Cabine Gruau

The car you see here is a significantly modified 505, it’s called the The Peugeot 505 Pick-Up Double Cabine Gruau and it was built by Carrosserie Gruau using a 505 station wagon as a starting point.

Carrosserie Gruau is a French coachbuilder and specialist vehicle manufacturer that started out all the way back in 1889 making horse carts. They adapted and changed significantly over the years, embracing the automobile revolution and becoming a major french carrosserie, or coachbuilder.

Gruau developed the 505 Pick-Up Double Cabine in-house and showed it to the public for the first time at the 1984 Paris Motor Show. Each of the six prototypes was built using a Peugeot 505 station wagon (estate) 2.5 liter diesel as a starting point, the rear was cut off and replaced with a cargo bed, the passenger cabin area was sealed and a rear window was put in.

The interior is largely unchanged from the original Peugeot 505, this example is a diesel model with a manual transmission.

The rear load bed had a size of 1.37 meters x 1.44 meters and a weight capacity of 675 kgs, making it ideal for many tradespeople. The original plan for the vehicle was to have it taxed as a commercial vehicle, making it less expensive to operate than a standard road car, while still having all of the benefits of a standard passenger vehicle.

Sadly for Gruau, this commercial vehicle classification was rejected, and the project was cancelled as a result. The six prototypes were sold off into private hands (registered as station wagons), and the project was abandoned.

The car you see here is one of the six original prototypes, it was first registered in 1985 in the Rhône region of France. Decades later in 2021 it would undergo a refurbishment, with all bodywork completed, new plaint applied, a tidied up interior, and a rebuilt drivetrain. The same stripes used on the Paris Motor Show car were then applied.

The car is now due to cross the auction block with Aguttes on the 19th of September in France, the price guide is €20,000 – €30,000 which works out to approximately $23,700 – $35,500 USD.

If you’d like to read more or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing.

Images courtesy of Aguttes

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A Jacobs 12.4 Liter 7-Cylinder Radial Engine Coffee Table

This Jacobs radial engine coffee table is the work of Dan Solheim, an aircraft technician and engineer who founded Creations From The Sol in order to turn aircraft parts into high-end furniture.

Solheim started out restoring classic American muscle cars in his teens and progressed from there to getting his A & P license, this is a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) certification for professionals that allows them to perform maintenance, repairs, or tests on aircraft.

“A & P” stands for “Airframe and Powerplant,” and this certification means that not only does Solheim work full time on maintaining and repairing aircraft, it means he’s also uniquely qualified to rebuilt radial engines as coffee tables.

The Jacobs radial engine coffee table is a great example of Dan’s work, the engine itself was sourced from a Stearman Model 75, later known as the Boeing-Stearman Model 75, or more simply as the Boeing Stearman.

This is almost certainly the heaviest coffee table that money can buy, the upside of that is that it won’t be knocked out of place easily.

The Jacobs R-755 is a 12.4 liter, seven-cylinder, air-cooled, radial engine originally manufactured by the Jacobs Aircraft Engine Company. Depending on specification the R-755 could produce anywhere from 200 to 350 hp, and a variant of the engine was used to power helicopters.

When building each piece, Dan make sure that the engine has all of the original parts and the correct hardware as called for in the original parts manuals. He can adjust the size of the glass top to meet each clients needs, with larger or smaller diameters being possible depending on the size of the space the table will fill.

As you may have guessed, these tables don’t come cheap, they sell via the Creations From The Sol Etsy store for $11,000 USD each with a $500 delivery fee in the USA. Each table is 100% made in the United States and the lead time on a new build each one is approximately 16 weeks.

If you’d like to read more about these unusual tables or place an order you can click here to visit the official store.

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For Sale: The Alfaholics Spider-R 007 – The Fastest Spider In The World

The Alfaholics Spider-R 007 was nicknamed the “The Fastest Spider In The World” by the British team who built it. It’s a 216 bhp Twin Spark-powered 1977 Spider with a 6-speed sequential gearbox, a competition LSD, and a slew of other go-faster parts that earned it its ambitious epithet.

For the uninitiated, Alfaholics is the world’s leading performance company for classic Alfa Romeos, they’re often described as an Alfa Romeo version of Eagle E-Types, Singer, or Emory but with a unique approach all their own.

Fast Facts – The Alfaholics Spider-R 007

• The car started life as an 1977 Alfa Romeo Spider S2 that was in need of a full restoration, rather than restore it back to factory original, Alfaholics were contracted to turn the car into a car capable of competing directly with their own GTA-R.
• The Alfaholics Spider-R 007 is fitted with a bespoke, internal tubular steel cage to stiffen the body and make it suitable for fast road and track day use.
• Under the hood you’ll find a 216 bhp Alfa Twin Spark inline-four cylinder engine with throttle body EFI and a programmable ECU.
• Power is sent to the rear wheels via a 6-speed sequential transmission and from there to a limited slip differential to the rear wheels.

Alfaholics – A History Speedrun

The company we know today as Alfaholics essentially began back in the 1970s when Richard Banks began restoring and racing Alfa Romeos in England.

Above Video: Chris Harris from Top Gear takes the legendary Alfaholics GTA-R for a spin.

Over the years he became one of the world’s leading experts in the field, and his two sons Maxim and Andrew grew up immersed in a world of nothing but Alfa Romeos, often with two dozen or more builds on the go at any one time.

In the 1990s the company went from supplying restored cars to taking on contract restoration work and selling parts, this then evolved into supplying performance parts for people who wanted their Alfas to be faster than stock – of which there were many.

Today the Bristol-based company is the world leader in the supply of performance parts for classic Alfas. In fact, he cars they build in-house are so good that Gordon Murray called them a few years ago and ordered a car from them for his own personal use – probably the single most remarkable accolade a company like this could receive.

The Alfaholics Spider-R 007

The Spider S2 you see here has been completely rebuilt, and despite its relatively understated looks it’s a vastly quicker car than its stock brethren. The owner had the car in his possession for many years, in 2011 he sent it in to Alfaholics and requested a full rebuild to turn it into one of the fastest street-legal Alfa Romeo Spiders in the world, if not the fastest outright.

The build began with a full teardown and a repair of any body panels that needed it, a new tubular stiffening cage was then fitted to the unibody to ensure it would be rigid enough for regular track use – the only caveat being that the owner didn’t want any of the cage to be visible above the car’s shoulder line.

Once the body was completed the car was then finished with Alfa 147 Bianco Nuvola, a pearl metallic white paint. With the shell completed the rebuild process could begin in earnest, all new Alfaholics GTA-R suspension package and brakes were fitted, with 6-piston disc brakes fitted up front and coil overs installed at each wheel.

In the engine bay a rebuilt Alfa Twin Spark engine was fitted, it’s a 2.0 liter inline-four cylinder engine with double overhead cams that has been improved with a big valve head with race-spec valve gear, billet rifle drilled cams, billet H-section conrods, forged pistons, an Alfaholics race paddle clutch kit was fitted, as well as 45mm Weber carburetors running with an Alfaholics 3D mapped ignition system.

No less attention was paid to the inside of the car, it’s fitted with quilted Ruby leather bucket seats and the rear section is trimmed to match, as are the doors, and the door tops and dashboard are finished with Alcantara.

In 2014 the car was returned to Alfaholics for a series of upgrades, these included the installation of a 6-speed sequential transmission, an Alfaholics programable throttle body fuel injection system, and a Race Technology digital dash conversion.

There’s no doubt that this is the nicest Alfa Spider we’ve ever seen come up for sale, not to mention the quickest, so it’ll be interesting to see where the bidding ends up.

If you’d like to read more about this unusual Spider or place a bid you can click here, it’s currently being auctioned live by Collecting Cars.

Images: Collecting Cars

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The Triumph Dolomite Sprint – The Affordable British Answer To The BMW 2002

The Triumph Dolomite Sprint is one of those classic cars that probably deserves to be quite a bit more famous than it actually is. The Sprint was developed to take the fight to the BMW 2002 and the Alfa Romeo 2000 GTV, however it never achieved anywhere near the same level of universal admiration.

For a number of reasons the Dolomite Sprint was an important car for the British motoring industry, when it was released it was the first mass-produced British car with alloy wheels as standard, and Triumph claimed that it was “the world’s first mass-produced multi-valve car” – the clever design of the cylinder head won a British Design Council award in 1974.

Fast Facts – The Triumph Dolomite Sprint

• The Triumph Dolomite Sprint was first released in 1973 as a high-performance member of the Project Ajax family of small cars developed by Triumph.
• The Sprint featured styling from Giovanni Michelotti, long a favorite designer for Triumph and also the designer of the BMW 2002.
• The Dolomite Sprint was designed to offer sports car-like performance in a saloon car package, much like the German 2002 and the Italian 2000 GTV, to meet the market demand for practical cars that were also fun and engaging to drive.
• Power was provided by a 1998cc single overhead cam inline-four with 16 valves, offering 127 hp and 122 lb ft of torque.

The Triumph Dolomite Sprint – A Practical Sports Car

When BMW released the 2002 in 1968 they struck gold, it was a smaller sized two-door saloon offered seating for four adults, ample trunk space, and all the practicality of a sedan while still offering sports car-like performance and handling.

The Michelotti-designed Triumph Dolomite is a four-door sedan with moderately sized trunk and space inside for up to five passengers.

The 2002 was named for its 2,000cc engine and two doors, 2000 + 2, and there were also 1602 and 1802 models offered. Cars that made use of a similar concept had been in production earlier of course, but the BMW 2002 became arguably the most famous example of the breed during its lifetime, having a significant influence on other manufacturers and on BMW vehicle design going forwards.

The standard Triumph Dolomite (the non-Sprint version) was released in 1972 with a more traditional slat-four engine that had pushrod actuated overhead valves, a swept capacity of 1,854cc, and a power output of 91 bhp.

The Triumph Dolomite Sprint would start life using the same basic body and running gear of the normal Dolomite, however things would change significantly in the engine bay. A team of engineers led by Spen King, working in conjunction with Harry Mundy and the engineers at Coventry Climax, would develop a new head for this inline-four that featured 16 valves all actuated by a single overhead camshaft.

The swept capacity of this new engine was increased to 1998cc, larger twin carburetors were added, and a series of other changes were made to increase power up to 135 bhp (SAE), or 127 bhp (DIN). This ~40% gain in power combined with the far more sporting nature of the new 16 valve engine transformed the Dolomite into a genuine competitor for its German and Italian rivals.

The top speed of the Dolomite Sprint was 119 mph (192 km/h) when new, a heady figure for a 2.0 liter sedan at the time, and the 0 to 60 mph time of 8.4 seconds was equally impressive.

When it was released, Triumph claimed that the 2.0 liter, 16-valve, inline-four used in the Dolomite made it “the world’s first mass-produced multi-valve car.”

The Sprint version and the standard Dolomite were among the most 70s-style cars ever made in Britain, they were originally finished in yellow but this soon gave way to a popular shade of brown and they often had vinyl covered roofs. There were other colors offered of course but brown does seem to have been remarkably popular during the age of disco, for reasons that are lost to history.

Although it does use unibody construction the Dolomite Sprint did still have a live axle rear end, albeit one sitting on coil springs, with independent suspension up front along with a front disc brake and a rear drum.

This more rudimentary suspension didn’t seem to impinge its performance in any significant way however, and out on the race track the car proved remarkably successful, competing in the British Saloon Car Championship from 1974 to 1978.

Andy Rouse and Tony Dron won the Manufacturers’ Championship in 1974, Rouse went on to win the Drivers’ Championship in 1975, and Dron very nearly won again 1977 – having won seven on the 12 races during the season he retired from the final race with a tire failure.

Perhaps unsurprisingly today there are relatively few surviving examples of the Sprint in good condition, with vastly fewer over in the United States were they were never officially imported. Some estimates put the number of Sprints privately imported into the USA at fewer than 10.

The interior of the car featured ample wood panelling and a well-equipped dashboard with all the dials you need for sporting driving, including a tachometer and various temperature and pressure monitoring gauges.

Although the car will likely never be as famous or beloved as the BMW 2002 or the Alfa Romeo 2000 GTV, there can be no doubt that it deserves better than its current place in the automotive world as little more than a curiosity that can’t even be correct identified by many classic cars fans.

The Triumph Dolomite Sprint

The Triumph Dolomite Sprint you see here is just about a perfect example of the species, it’s finished in that famous shade of 1970s brown with the black vinyl roof, and interestingly it was originally a Leyland works car.

This Sprint is a multi-award winner, having claimed a fair amount of silverware at various concours events over the years – all of which is included with the car now. The history file is extensive, including every MoT the car has ever had, it also comes with a rare original brochure, an owner’s handbook, and the service passport booklet with 14 stamps in it.

The car is now due to roll across the auction block with Historics Auctioneers on the 25th of September in England with a price guide of £12,000 – £15,000, this works out to approximately $16,600 – $20,750 USD.

If you’d like to read more about the car or register to bid you can click here to visit the listing.

Images courtesy of Historics Auctioneers

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